Embassy of the United States, Oslo, Norway (Amerikanske Ambassaden i Oslo) Review

The Embassy was kind enough to give my parents who are 92 and extremely frail a 2 pm appointment. That being said the visit was horrible, standing outside a locked door in freezing cold and wind. We saw no one inside and no one acknowledged our presence.Finally as I walk around the corner a guard asked for our passports through the fence????
Totally unprofessional.

So as long as you have followed the proper procedures explained on the website. Things will be much easier for you and processed quicker, relative to the time it actually takes to process your application. My application went very fast.

Move it away from downtown Oslo into the perifery. To heavy security meassures around the building.

I was making USA Visa so I needed to visit the building itself.
I have to admit that I was much to early so taken time to watch the building from reasonable sides (as I was a bit scarred to go around the fence to not look suspicious). It does look lovely, building itself, and the area around it. I do not know why it is so big as I was only going thru small part of it to get the visa.
I am not judging the people working there as they have job to do and it probably depends who you meet. I did not give max stars for two reasons: first, it is a bit out of place and can be time consuming to get there, second reason was that I had appointment as first person in given day and they just ignored it. I was able to do what I needed but they have been not even pretending they are in a hurry to meet the hour they themselves told me to be there (and it was cold, and I was waiting outside, and... you got a point, it just wasn't professional).

I needed to wait 50 minutes outside the embassy until I get in. It was -8 degrees with wind and snow. I couldn't feel my feet and hands anymore. I can't believe they treat American citizens worse than a homeless dog on a street. There was a couple with a couple month baby in the line. It took these monsters 10 minutes to let them inside! Why don't you make appointments at different times so 22 people don't show up at the same time (10am)??? Please don't treat people like this and have some organization in this embassy!

Went today for consular services. Friendly staff. Guards were strict but friendly. Embassy staff was professional and organized.

Nice people in from the door to the heart of the embassy!
Very helpful in obtaining Visa

Very fast and helpful service, even with the current corona situation. I sent an email with two questions and received an informative reply the next day. For one of the matters, I would have needed to set up an appointment. The embassy explained that it is closed for appointments until further notice, with exceptions only for emergencies, because of the pandemic. I wasn't entirely sure what would qualify as an emergency, but I explained my situation just to hear what my options were. The matter I contacted them about is dependent on a time-limited document from another country, and if I didn't get an appointment with the embassy before that time expired, I would have to begin a long and expensive process all over again. I asked if it was possible to make an appointment in May due to this. I was impressed by how quickly I received a reply from them. They had offered me an appointment early in May. I had not been expecting such quick and excellent service in this hectic period. I appreciate their understanding of my situation, as well as how thoroughly they communicated.

Absolutely respectful and timely staff and service!

Citizen services are extremely professional and organized. Big thanks to them!

It was great visit everyone was awesome thanks for your help and keep up the good job that U R doing for our citizens...and visitors.

Guns out all around & a pretty ugly looking building imposing itself on the area. Maybe that's the intention?

The people who work there are incredibly nice and understanding.

A request to help money married to a foreigner was requested by an American abandonment

Extremely unprofessional place, ruined my job offer

Arrive early in the morning to the appointment, the security guard outside talk to low and the problem is only my girlfriend can enter so I have to pay the papers but I have to wait outside of the embassy in Oslo whit -10 degrees. Why whit all the space the embassy have don't have a waiting room check that the service is really bad

bad service and unfriendly staff. the building is ugly as hell too

I was in need of assistance as I was a student in Norway. I asked one of the staff if I could make a call, I was promptly rejected. Very hostile place. Also the building looks out of place and ruins a beautiful view.

First trip to the new embassy. Mixed bag.
First impression, the new building itself looks like a combination of a Church of Latter Day Saints, combined with an up-scale drug addiction clinic (in-patient), and a private middle school in suburbian Virginia. But for the iron fence around it, however, it is a much more relaxing setting than the previous intimidating black monolith near the Palace. I really liked the seperate entrance for American citizen services. Quick and effective, and no more passing passports through the fence, like family visits to the gulag. Yet, it gets a bit confusing once inside where a set of 3 identical doors that you are vaguely waved toward take on a sort of "Laugh-In" effect: "from which door will Dan Rowan pop out?"

The security guards are all Norwegian. Now, is it just me, or does this feel strange how Norwegian citizens, working in my embassy, somehow make me full vaguely guilty (and scared) for coming to renew my own birthright passport at my own embassy? I guess I just have to accept the fact that this is where we are at in this world these days outsourced and scared. That doesn't mean I don't "get it". There is a reason why the US embassy has been shunted to the unwilling outskirts of Oslo, and away from the Royal Palace, unlike the folksy embassies of smaller, less prominent (and less despised) nations of, say, Portugal (pictured below). Or even Russia. Or Israel. Anywho.

The bank-like atmosphere in the new (and a bit small? I mean, the new building is 'UGE! Makes me wonder what they need all that extra space for...) waiting room was relaxing, and nostalgic with many of the same childrens' toys having made the trip from the old embassy. Here, there is a great contrast. The people working INSIDE the embassy are generally friendly and familiar enough to put one at ease (the guard inside actually yawned and smiled and nodded when we came in, in a singular reassuring moment of Mayberry-esque down home-ness)

Yet, when we got to the last window (you have to speak to three different people at three different windows) we got a "funny guy". Though friendly-ish, he was smug and a little too unprofessionally sarcastic. And though I doubt it was solely his idea, he felt the need to ask our 11-year-old kid if the information in her current passport was correct, and if that was indeed HER picture...uh... But to top it all off, in a grandiose flourish of Trumpian histrionics and bear in mind this a routine passport RENEWAL for a child he made us all raise our right hands and swear that the info we were providing was truthful, right there in front of him, God, and everyone in the itsy-bitsy waiting room. And to tell the truth (I swear!), I don't know who felt more akward about it: him, God, us, or everyone in the itsy-bitsy waiting room. Now, I don't know about you, but if someone is already a liar and lying....oh, well. Maybe I am thinking too much. Which I am fully aware is entirely out of political fashion these days.

I will close by complaining about the fee. Not necessarily the increased cost ($150, which the also conspicuously non-American clerk who first helped us explained to me was fair, and that the Norwegian passport was waaaaay too cheap. Makes people not appreciate them--I paraphrase). It was more this kind of shell-game, deceptive, RyanAir approach to pricing. On the Embassy website, it lists the fee for passport renewal as $80. But when you get there, they tell you it cost something like $150. I asked why, and the clerk explained that it costs $80 for the book, but another $25 fee because a human has to wait on
you. Here, the US Embassy diverges from RyanAir, who at least has self-check in machines, so I can choose not to pay this fee with them. The other $45 fee was for the heavily armed security shake-down option that I don't remember clicking on when I made my reservation. So there you have it. A mixed bag of an embassy for a mixed bag of a fatherland. From "melting pot" to "mixed bag". I guess it all makes sense, somehow.

This was the first time I was greeted in my mother tongue (!) by a foreign embassy. What a great way to welcome someone, very impressed by the smart young man handling visa applications. Thank you for making my visit something to remember.

Everyone was friendly, orderly and punctual. Several hand disinfectant dispencers available. Some visitors, but I felt safe regarding the corona virus.

Looks like a KGB prison and has guards yelling at you if you dare to take a picture. The building is so out of step with the beautiful architecture of Oslo, it is an embarrassing eyesore. No worries taking photos of the other elegant embassies in Frogner.